Chelyabinsk meteorite? No! A Russian hypersonic missile exploded, the prototype of which was tested abnormally. Nezavisimaya Gazeta stunned with such a sensation. Although it was not the first.
Immediately after the explosion over Chelyabinsk, the well-known publicist Yulia Latynina appeared in Novaya Gazeta with an article under the heading "What side number did the meteorite have?"
Vladimir Zhirinovsky also warmed up the conspiracy theory. And he assured that the Ural phenomenon was a test of a new weapon. But not ours, but American. And now, two months later, when the passions seemed to have subsided and the collected pieces of the heavenly stone were examined by scientists, the rocket version for some reason surfaced again. True, it is presented by the journalist Viktor Myasnikov. Push. Does not give a single expert opinion. At least a retired military man.
Here is how, according to the journalist, events actually developed: “At dawn on February 15, a strategic missile carrier Tu-160 with a ballistic missile on a suspension took off, which instead of a third stage and a warhead carried a prototype of a hypersonic missile. Having gained an altitude of 20 km and a speed of over 2 thousand km / h, the plane launched a launch vehicle. She went beyond the atmosphere.
Here the last stage with the prototype load separated. Having accelerated in the vacuum of space, the hypersonic rocket in a few minutes was supposed to fall in the White Sea region … When the trajectory of the rocket passed over a populated area, it suddenly went down. At an altitude of 92 km, it entered the atmosphere and flew further, leaving a contrail, along a very gentle trajectory almost parallel to the Earth's surface. This is a typical angle of entry and movement for objects from near-earth orbit, such as spent satellites.
… The explosion, accompanied by a powerful shock wave and unusually bright puffs of fire typical for high-calorie fuel, did not completely destroy the rocket … Already on February 16, it was officially announced that not a single fragment had been found, and the search was stopped. This could mean only one thing: the FSB found what it was looking for. Namely, the remnants of the rocket."
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For clarification, I turned to experts - specialists in celestial objects and unusual phenomena. Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Director of the Institute of Astronomy of the Russian Academy of Sciences Boris Shustov advised not to read "all sorts of utter nonsense." Mikhail Nazarov, Deputy Chairman of the Committee on Meteorites of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Head of the Laboratory of Cosmochemistry and Meteorics at the Institute of Geochemistry and Analytical Chemistry (GEOCHI), RAS, was no less categorical in his assessment:
- It can not be so. We collected a lot of material at the crash site, and no traces of the impact of the rocket were found there.
OPINION OF A MILITARY EXPERT
Instead of scientific facts - "cosmic tales"?
Military observer "KP" Viktor Baranets asked to comment on the riddle of the doctor of military-technical sciences, deputy director general of the research institute of the Ministry of Defense, dealing with the problems of repelling space threats, Andrei Kalmykov.
- Andrey Mikhailovich, how do you like the version of the explosion of a hypersonic missile near Chelyabinsk?
- This is not a version and not a hypothesis, this is an illiterate fairy tale. I see absolutely no reason to discuss this rubbish. For he is used to working with real materials, concrete facts and figures, and not with conjectures and fantasies.
- But the author analyzes the material and the facts. After all, we actually saw in the video a snow-white contrail, which, it is claimed, is characteristic of rockets and jet planes, and not for meteorites …
- Tell me, when a giant block of ice melts from strong heating, does black smoke come out of it, or is it steam?
- But the vapor quickly dissipates, and here there was a steady white tail …
- A meteorite is a conglomerate of a variety of space materials, and when entering the dense layers of the atmosphere, they behave differently. There is a very complex chemical composition of substances. In addition, you need to know basic things: a hypersonic missile does not leave such a giant "contrail". And if she had crashed, then after such an explosion, the place of her fall would have been found in an hour! But these tales about the Tu-160, allegedly carrying a "ballistic missile" under its belly with a hypersonic apparatus as the third stage - even Baron Munchausen would not have thought of such a story! You should at least occasionally read the "Young Technician" magazine! There, the system for launching hypersonic missiles has long been painted in colors and paints.
And how can you seriously discuss this - "the fragments fell at different angles"? Has the author of this "version" seen them? Measured the angles? Yes, if there were fragments, then why should they fall to the ground at the same angle? Where is the logic? Why make people laugh?
COMMENTS BY OTHER SCIENTISTS
Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Head of the Department of Planetary Research of Cosmochemistry of the Vernadsky Institute of Geochemistry of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, Professor Mikhail Marov:
- If it was a rocket, then I would definitely know about it. We have reliable data that it was a meteorite. Just a week ago I was giving a big seminar at the Sternberg State Astronomical Institute. All specialists with professional knowledge of meteorites were present. Our conclusion is unambiguous: it was a more or less ordinary astronomical phenomenon. However, in terms of the scale of its destruction, since it happened in a densely populated area, it is unmatched. This is confirmed by measurements made by American specialists from NASA.
Nail Bakhtigaraev, Senior Researcher of the Zvenigorod Observatory:
- About the rocket - it's a duck, of course. Invented by her lovers. Professionals won't say that. The speed of an approaching meteorite is several times higher than the speed of the fastest rockets. - The authors of the "sensation" accuse, for example, scientists of the fact that the fragments allegedly fell at different angles, including in the opposite direction, which in principle cannot be in the case of a meteorite. This is true? - No, when the speed of the meteorite had already dropped, it was destroyed, an explosion. And the debris fell in all directions. And they were also of different shapes, so they could plan and change direction in the atmosphere.
Head of the Department of Space Astrometry of the Institute of Astronomy of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences Lidiya Rykhlova:
- Already more than 500 kg of meteorite matter were found only by those who went to the Urals on an expedition. There were scientists from both the committee on meteorites and our institute. Let alone how many people gathered. My colleagues walked around the villages, and even 130 km from Chelyabinsk, residents showed them fragments of a chicken egg. Moreover, a NASA representative, a meteorite specialist, went there with our scientists. No one has any doubts that a meteorite has fallen.
In addition, several pieces of a meteorite have already been sawed at the Committee on Meteorites of the Institute of Geochemistry and Analytical Chemistry (GEOKHI) of the Russian Academy of Sciences and found out what they consist of. It turned out to be an ordinary chondrite. Ordinary - not because they often occur, but because they are completely standard in structure. Very long ago and well studied.
BTW
Yulia Latynina: "I generally need to be silent in a rag"
- I generally need to be silent in a rag. In the morning, when the amount of damage was not yet clear, but it was clear that something like that had fallen … I looked: not a fig, this thing was flying along a trajectory from one polygon to another! Instead of holding on to this idea, I hastened to acquaint the readers of Novaya Gazeta with it. Naturally, this is absolute nonsense … (An apology for the "Board number …" was aired on the air of "Echo of Moscow".)
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Moscow scientists: Chebarkul meteorite is at least 4.5 billion years old
In the meteoritics laboratory of the Moscow Vernadsky Institute, on a small table in bottles and bags with fragments of different sizes: from millimeter to pebbles no less than two centimeters in diameter.
Under the watchful eye of the head of the laboratory, Mikhail Nazarov, we examine a miracle from space through a microscope. The heavenly visitor consists of minerals of different colors: black, white, gray, and the whole is permeated with shiny veins of metal.
- There are clearly visible traces of melt, - the scientist shows a dark gray strip on the cut of the meteorite. - This means that once there was a blow of one celestial body against another. Perhaps it was after this that the fragment went on a journey and, billions of years later, crossed the Earth's orbit. These traces of melt are quite rare and interesting phenomenon.